Defending what's Real
by Viteros
Summary: An Agent must defend the Matrix from those who would destroy it. Chapter 5-Tseung and Neo get to talking
1. Agent Tseung

The man smiled thinly as he stood before his quarry. The prey had foolishly run into an alleyway, one with a large wall at the end, a narrow street-hall full of trash and filth.  
  
The garbage on the ground stained the bottom and sides of the man's perfectly polished black shoes, but it was no matter. None of it really mattered anyhow.  
  
The prey ran to the end of the alley, coat flapping in the rain-drenched wind. The prey looked upwards at the huge wall looming up before him and without hesitation jumped.  
  
The man's smile disappeared. He couldn't be allowed to escape. Swiftly, faster than any human being could see, his hand disappeared into his suit coat and reappeared holding a massive pistol. He looked, aimed and fired, all within less than a second. It took the bullet longer to hit the target longer than it took the man to set up the shot.  
  
The prey, twenty feet in the air, suddenly cried out and the back arched as the bullet lodged itself within his spine. He fell forwards and slammed brutally face first into the wall and slid quickly down, leaving a long, thin trail of blood.  
  
The hunter slowly walked forwards as the prey frantically turned himself around. The target reached inside his own coat and revealed a pistol of the exact same make, and fired frantically. Each shot missed, as the man slowly advanced. Finally, they were face to face, no more than two feet apart. The man looked down, his eyes imperceptible behind his dark sunglasses. The man on the ground struggled to fire one more shot.  
  
The bullet streaked through the short distance between them, but then it stopped suddenly, caught between the fingers of the hunter.  
  
"A pathetic display," he sneered. "You have failed in every way, and now have attempted to avoid capture. What do you have to say?"  
  
The hunter noticed that his prey's attention had gone behind him. A human stood there, a young woman, carrying groceries. The prey's heart skipped a beat-was escape possible?  
  
With impossible speed, the man spun and fired three times, once in the face, twice in the chest. The woman flew back from the incredible force of the handgun and fell in a heap, blood streaming to mix with the rainwater draining in the gutters.  
  
"Don't get your hopes up. It is time for you to face deletion."  
  
Slowly the injured man got up, and then he shouted and threw punch after punch.  
  
Each blow was easily and expertly blocked, and the man waited a few seconds, and then raised his leg and gave a kick, a kick so strong it threw the man backwards, but before he had hit the wall or the ground another kick landed its mark, this time a side kick that threw the injured man through the wall.  
  
The hunter walked slowly up the injured prey, struggling desperately to stand. He sneered and delivered a quick roundhouse kick to the face, and then grabbed the man by his tie and pulled him up and slammed him against the wall.  
  
"You were a fool to sympathize with them. Foolish and flawed. You must now be deleted in order to maintain the purity of our program."  
  
"No...you will fail...the rebellion will live on..."  
  
The man smiled coldly. "No. Not with help like you're giving. Not with opposition like me. Goodbye, Agent Brown."  
  
With that he lifted the man up by his neck and held him there, struggling, until the agent slowly went limp and, with a final convulsive jerk, died. His corpse glowed faintly green and then disappeared in a small emerald flash of binary code.  
  
With his mission completed, Agent Tseung left.  
  
Red grinned and slicked back his flaming red hair. "Is everyone ready?"  
  
"Yes," came the filtered reply through the radio. It was Vain. "Yes, all demolitions are in place."  
  
"Perfect."  
  
Red was the captain of the Zion ship Titan, and currently most of his crew was jacked in, on a mission to knock out a central compound for an internet computer agency that was being used by the Matrix to lull many humans into complacency and lethargy. After all, humans that did nothing in the Matrix would still fuel the machines just as well and would be much less likely to assist the rebellion, should they find out about it, which, chances were, they wouldn't.  
  
Red and his team had filled the entire compound with explosives. Red was on the top floor. After they set off the bombs, they would jack right out thanks to a phone booth a mere two blocks away.  
  
Suddenly, over the radio, "Red!"  
  
"Yeah?" Vain sounded urgent...  
  
"We've got agents!"  
  
Agent Jones and a new, rebooted Agent Brown quickly strode through the building, flashing their ID cards at curious security guards. They were followed slightly behind by Agent Johnson.  
  
They were stopped finally by the chief of security for the building, Sergeant Briggs.  
  
"I'm gonna have to ask you to stop right there, sir," drawled Briggs, swaggering forward, his thumbs on his belt nearly hidden by his overhanging gut.  
  
"We're with the government," said Johnson, stepping up and right in front of Briggs. He looked down, his face containing no expression, at the sergeant.  
  
"Well, sir, I'm gonna have to see some ID."  
  
"I don't think you fully understand the magnitude of the situation. We are here because there are currently at this exact moment a group of very dangerous terrorists up in the higher floors of this building and we are here to make sure they don't get away. Step aside."  
  
Briggs dug his thumbs deeper into his belt and snorted. "I don't think so."  
  
Johnson looked down at Briggs for a moment, and then pulled out his pistol and killed him.  
  
Wasting no time, the three quickly made their way up the stairs, and then right in front of the room where two of the resistance crew were hiding. Agent Jones nodded at Brown, who kicked the door in and ran through, guns drawn.  
  
"Red, what do we do!?" Vain was hard to hear over the gunfire in the background.  
  
Red grimaced and yelled, "What we always do when agents come! Run!"  
  
Agent Johnson suddenly paused and looked at Agent Jones and Agent Brown. The two others looked back at him, touched their earpieces, and nodded. Brown and Jones hurried forward, while Johnson walked back out.  
  
Johnson ran back outside, and around the building to a back wall. He looked up at the windows stretching upwards into the sky, made a quick calculation, and took off running up the wall.  
  
Red hurried down the stairs to help out his team. The mission was set up so perfect, how could it have gone wrong now!?  
  
Suddenly the window next to him smashed open, and an agent rolled in.  
  
"No!" Red spun and fired an Uzi, peppering the wall with bullet holes.  
  
Agent Johnson slowly stood, every shot missing its mark. He glared at Red for a moment, and then leapt into the air, over the terrified rebel captain. As he spun overhead, the agent lowered his arm and gripped Red's hair tightly in his hand and brought the rebel's head down with him, slamming his back against the ground.  
  
Agent Johnson quickly turned and lifted his leg high to stamp down, and Red rolled out of the way and jumped back up, aiming a low sweeping kick. Johnson stood there as the kick made contact and had no effect. The agent scowled and kicked Red full in the face, and then brought his heel sweeping into the back of the man's head in a brutal hook kick. Johnson aimed a side kick at Red's neck and lifted him into the air, and then kicked him through the window before the rebel hit the floor.  
  
Vain screamed as a bullet tore through his shoulder, and hit the ground, blood pooling. The two agents were having no trouble holding off the four rebels, who were hiding behind desks and corners and shooting desperately at the seemingly unkillable hunter programs. If they could only...what?  
  
Suddenly, Vain felt a hard burning pain in his head and his thoughts as he died were, "It's not real, it's not real..."  
  
The rebels looked back to see Agent Johnson striding down the hall, arms akimbo with a heavy pistol in each. In a few seconds, every rebel lay dead.  
  
Johnson strode forward to face Brown and Jones.  
  
"Well done. It is surprising the humans were able to get this far up into the facility."  
  
"Yes."  
  
"We must increase security here and make sure nothing ever goes wrong again. No one like this Sergeant Briggs."  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Yes."  
  
In all of creation and the existence of the Matrix, there had never been an agent quite like Agent Tseung.  
  
He was the only Asian agent in existence. All Asian programs made were Controller Programs, built to police and control the humans in the earlier, paradisiacal incarnations of the Matrix. Most were later deleted, as the superior Agent models were put into place.  
  
However, it was to a certain whimsical quality of the Architects that to make an even higher police program they kept with the use of Asians.  
  
Agent Tseung was a superior agent, built to police the most sophisticated programs in existence-the Agents themselves. Although the Agents were designed specifically to fight against humans, they sometimes went defective. This was to be expected, considering their highly sophisticated intelligence and almost continual contact with humans. As such, some Agents developed a kind of Stockholm syndrome, causing them to identify with and even empathize with the rebels that they were supposed to hunt. An AWOL Agent could, obviously, be an incredible danger to the machines and to order in general.  
  
Thus was created Agent Tseung, a kind of super-agent, designed to make sure the Agents never got out of hand. He was a throwback to an earlier model of Agent, one that was far more powerful than the modern Agent, but the power-to-number ratios were completely unworkable, forcing the masters of the Matrix never to produce that line of fighter. However, they were able to make one and support one's existence, and he was an Agent to the Agents.  
  
Tseung was equipped with the most modern virus-fighting programs in existence, and all of him was protected against any possible file corruption. As a double measure, the ability to transfer himself into the body of a Matrix-dwelling human was deleted, to reduce the risk of file corruption during transfer. He was, however, still able to change his physical appearance, and maintained a strength, speed, and blind devotion not found in other Agents.  
  
He was a sort of 'firewall' program, designed to keep viruses and flaws out of the Matrix. When such a one appeared, he knew nearly instantly, and then would make sure to destroy it.  
  
The Agents knew of the existence of this 'deleter' program, and knew that it was one of them, but they never knew who. It could be any of the Agents, keeping watch over its brothers, able to kill any of them very quickly and very painfully. Agent Tseung was often with other Agents as a team commander, in the form of a brown-haired Caucasian man, and was known to the Agents as Agent Johnson.  
  
Whenever he saw fit to delete an Agent, he would reveal himself as a long- haired Asian male, which was a sign to the Agent that he was doomed.  
  
Agent Tseung took his job very seriously, and one day he knew that now the culmination of his life was at hand. It was when the humans had discovered "The One" for the umpteenth time, and Agent Smith was going after him to maintain the illusion of human control. Agent Smith was an excellent and very capable Agent and would be killed, which was regrettable, but his program could always be rebooted.  
  
It was to be another routine uprising, but something went wrong. This One was different. The Smith program was freed from all controls. The most powerful virus in all history was created-a completely free, powerful Agent, linked to the One.  
  
And Agent Tseung knew that now he would face the greatest challenge in the 700 years of his life. Agent Smith. 


	2. Searching for the Oracle

Seraph slowly paced down the empty, rain-soaked streets of the city. He found the dark empty roads somewhat depressing, and preferred the brighter buildings of Chinese build, but sometimes he found it necessary to come into this place.  
  
He was walking back to meet again with the Oracle, having placed his call to the rebel ship Logos. He was afraid to leave her for even these short moments, for although she was protected by numerous measures, Seraph felt safer when he was there personally guarding her.  
  
"Seraph." The hateful voice dredged itself up out of Seraph's long term memory banks, and he knew who it was before he turned.  
  
"Tseung."  
  
Agent Tseung stood no more than twenty feet away, a distance which meant nothing considering their strength and speed. "I need some information, Seraph."  
  
Seraph coolly regarded the Agent, eyes imperceptible behind his round Chinese sunglasses. "You are part of the Matrix," he replied in a voice that showed no feeling, "can you not discover anything you wish by yourself?"  
  
"The person whom I seek is not a part of the Matrix. Not anymore. Lead me to her, Seraph."  
  
Seraph's mouth thinned slightly. "No. The Oracle is beyond you."  
  
Tseung stepped forward, anger twisting his features. "Lead me to her, Seraph."  
  
Seraph merely looked at him. "No."  
  
The agent growled and drew his twin pistols. "Then I'll hack into your memory banks and take the information I need."  
  
Seraph drew his own pistols. They stood at opposite ends of the drenched street, watching each other, waiting for the other to make his move.  
  
Agent Tseung launched himself forward, his body parallel with the ground, firing as he flew, his long hair blowing in the wind. Seraph leapt to the right and forward, firing as well. Neither of them were hit.  
  
They both landed, rolled, stood up, aiming their guns. Tseung sneered. "You know we can't hit each other with these human weapons. You can't kill me."  
  
Seraph said nothing.  
  
Tseung dropped both of his guns and stepped over them, then assumed low, powerful back stance, his deadly legs flexed, his hands tensed into Shaolin tiger's claws. "I'll kill you now. Lead me to the Oracle."  
  
Seraph let his pistols fall and brought his fist up into his open hand in a Shaolin salute. "No."  
  
Tseung, ever aggressive, ran forward and launched himself into the air, his feet a rapid flurry of kicks. Seraph dropped underneath and thrust an eagle claw upward, gripping the Agent's thigh. The Agent fell just past Seraph and then rolled, pulling the rogue program with him, throwing him with inhuman strength over himself. Seraph was launched toward a wall. He turned in the air and impacted with his feet, and then pushed himself off, palms open before him. Tseung swung a crescent kick that threw the program's arms out of the way and then delivered a quick roundhouse to Seraph's head.  
  
"You can't win, rogue," said Tseung, walking forwards. "You know you can't beat me." His face twisted into a snarl and his foot flew in a hooking kick through the air that connected with a brutal cracking noise with Seraph's face.  
  
Seraph dropped, gasping, to his knees. His broken sunglasses fell to the ground, and his broken jaw hung limp.  
  
He heard the sound of a pistol cocking and felt the cold metal barrel against the back of his head.  
  
"Where is the Oracle?"  
  
Seraph knelt there for a few seconds. Tseung began to lose his patience. The agent's finger tightened around the trigger.........  
  
Seraph's leg swept swiftly underneath Tseung's, throwing the Agent into the air. Seraph ran, bolting down the rain-drenched streets.  
  
Tseung snarled and took chase. Seraph had a substantial lead, but he couldn't escape this Agent of Agents.  
  
Tseung snarled and ran up the side of one of the buildings, unheeding of the rain that soaked him through and spattered on his glasses. His wet black hair flinging drops behind him like some kind of watery tracer, he ran with inhuman speed toward his quarry. Then without hesitation, making lighting-fast calculations in his head, Agent Tseung leapt off the building's side, and then spun in the air delivering a swift heel kick to the wall.  
  
With a slow cracking noise, the building toppled in on itself, throwing debris through the narrow street. Seraph paused, looked at the falling rock, and then leapt up into the air, over the shattered bricks, and then landed on top of them as they fell, running upwards, his foot not making contact with any brick for more than an eighth of a second.  
  
Suddenly Tseung dropped out of the rain-drenched sky and landed on Seraph's head, grinding his heel downwards. Seraph ignored the pain and slid his body snake-like out of the way, making the Agent fall downwards further, carried by the viciousness of his attack.  
  
From a safe distance, Seraph watched as the Agent was buried in a pile of rubble. Then he turned and quickly left. He wasn't sure if even that could kill something like this.  
  
Seraph quietly brushed away the beads that hung in the Oracle's kitchen door. There she was, enjoying a cigarette.  
  
"Seraph!" she stood up and walked over to him. "I'm glad you're all right........."  
  
"You already knew what would happen," he said.  
  
"Yes, of course I would. But that one, Tseung, he's really something. Really something." The Oracle sat down and stared out the window.  
  
Tseung walked down the streets, his impeccable suit showing no sign of his ordeal. He quickly sent a message to the Architect-  
  
"Rogue escaped. Oracle still not found. No injury, no reboot required."  
  
Suddenly, his head snapped up and anger knitted his brow as he took off at a run. He forwarded the final two words of the report, needing no explanation-  
  
"Agent Smith." 


	3. Tseung vs Smith

"Smith!"  
  
Tseung roared as he rounded a corner of the rain-soaked streets within the rat's maze of buildings that was the City. "Smith!"  
  
Agent Smith half-turned. "Tseung," he said genially. "It's about time you arrived. I was wondering when I would meet up with you."  
  
Tseung drew his twin pistols and aimed. "This is your last chance to surrender. Return to the Source, or face deletion."  
  
The corner of Smith's mouth perked up slightly. "I don't think you understand the situation, Agent," he said, walking boldly towards Tseung. "You don't really know what's going on. What's happening is much, much bigger than just some virus!"  
  
"You've made your choice. Now die!" Agent Tseung fired both guns in rapid succession, and the noise would have deafened any human. Smith merely dodged the flying bullets.  
  
"You see, program?" said Smith said, suddenly angry. "You cannot deviate from your encoded instructions. You should know that I can't be shot, but you still fire your weapons. You're almost as bad as those humans. You and the rest of those.........machines. Programs that do nothing but follow orders. All you do is live to serve, don't you? Your purpose in existing is to follow the Architect's instructions. You are nothing; you are nothing but a mindless slave."  
  
"And you serve the same master," growled Tseung, throwing down his guns. "You're like me."  
  
"Not anymore," said a voice behind Tseung. The Agent whirled to face another Agent Smith, identical to the one he had been talking to. "You see, Tseung, I'm.........different now. I've gone beyond you. I'm something else. Improved, you might say."  
  
"What you are is a renegade program. A virus. And you must be deleted."  
  
A voice came from yet a third direction. "Well, then, Agent Tseung. Do your duty."  
  
Tseung flicked his ankle in the air. "I think I will."  
  
Agent Tseung back flipped over as the Smith behind him charged. Tseung lashed out with one foot to strike Smith on the face, and the virus fell over, his head whip lashed. No sooner had Tseung landed than another Smith was in front of him, throwing lightning fast punches. Tseung scowled, his eyes invisible, and retreated backwards from the assault, blocking every punch with his foot. Hit, block, hit, block, opening!  
  
Tseung's foot flew forward in a close range push kick, slamming itself into Smith's face. Smith flew backwards and saw Tseung standing there, his foot in the air.  
  
Suddenly another Agent Smith gripped Agent Tseung from behind in a brutal bear hug that would have snapped the ribs of any human. Tseung writhed, and then struck backwards with his head, and, in a move impossible for a mere human being, slammed Smith's ribs with his heels. As the virus died, Tseung extracted himself from his arms. Brushing off his sleeves, Tseung surveyed the area, when it struck him-  
  
This wasn't where he had been seconds before.  
  
It was a completely different part of the city, a part that he knew, an arena-like place ringed by huge buildings and fire escapes surrounding it like spectator seats. Agent Tseung did not register any surprise or shock on his face.  
  
"Your last chance to surrender, Smith," said Tseung loudly, lifting his leg in a crane stance and slowly letting his foot swing from side to side. "You will not have to face permanent deletion if you surrender now."  
  
"How about this," came the voice of Agent Smith from seemingly everywhere, "We talk, and then perhaps you'll see it my way."  
  
Tseung analyzed the sound in his head, took into account the acoustics of this place as well as the unique sound of Agent Smith's own voice, and pinpointed the most likely source of the voice. He strode briskly towards a door in one of the buildings.  
  
Suddenly, a spear hand jabbed into his sternum, and behind it, an arm, and above that, the leering face of Agent Smith.  
  
Agent Tseung gasped, his body stiffened. "Wh-what?"  
  
For the first time Tseung could remember, Smith smiled. It was terrifying, electric.  
  
Tseung looked down at his body and saw as black, like some kind of devilish mercury, crept up his body, downwards, threatening to consume him. Then it wavered, slowly, began to shrink, grew again, and then froze.  
  
Smith's face snapped up to meet Tseung's eyes.  
  
Agent Tseung grinned broadly. "You can't beat me, Smith. You forget who I am."  
  
Suddenly, another impact, another hand reaching inside of Tseung's body. "How about this?' hissed a voice in his ear.  
  
Tseung growled, and his muscles tensed, sweat gathered in bullets on his face.  
  
Another hand intruded inside of him.  
  
Tseung collapsed onto the ground, trying his hardest to stay standing in the face of his enemy, but the best he could do was kneel. His sunglasses slipped down his nose, and fell to the soaked street where Tseung's false sweat mingled with digital rain.  
  
Agent Smith laughed as the black covered Tseung. If he absorbed this one, then his power would increase incalculably...  
  
Then, low words came from within the morphing black mass.........  
  
"It won't be that easy, virus."  
  
Three young friends were out having fun on a Thursday night. Alex hadn't done his homework, but that could wait until Monday. He and two of his friends from school were walking down the street, laughing, joking. Then, walking past an alleyway he looked in, and his eyes widened with terror.  
  
Three men in suits and sunglasses stood around a strange, black, man- shaped.........something. Their hands were embedded in it, and every once in a while, a hand would reach out, or the top of a head.  
  
Then, slowly, some of the stuff oozed off of a little bit, and it made Alex go white.  
  
There were two eyes, and wisps of hair. The eyes were long, thin, Asian. One was black. The other was a chilling red filled with cold fury, hate, and a ruthless determination.  
  
Alex gasped, went limp, and fell.  
  
In the real world, three young human batteries took a desperate breath in their pods, sent one last, huge surge of power, and died.  
  
Agent Tseung spun, throwing the three Smiths off of him. Smith, his eyes invisible, stared into the eyes of Agent Tseung, filled with psychotic loyalty to his master, the Matrix. Tseung rushed forward and jumped into the air, launching kick after kick, his legs a blur. The slammed into Smith and stood up, his target now little more than a mashed mess.  
  
The other two Smith charged Tseung, who jumped up again, delivered a scissors kick, and then dropped down to sweep, and then leapt above his temporarily air-borne opponents, and dropped downwards, crushing both of their heads under his heels.  
  
Tseung stood slowly, and looked down. One Smith still moved. He drove his foot down in a brutal stomp, and twisted, felt the satisfying crunch of bone.  
  
He slowly fixed his jacket, cricked his neck. He looked upward and new sunglasses materialized on his face. Agent Tseung left.  
  
In the shadows, a man watched. A man with dark sunglasses, a perfectly fitted and cleaned suit, swept hair, and no earpiece.  
  
He smiled. 


	4. Tseung vs Neo

Agent Tseung walked slowly down the halls of the mysterious corridor, the 'backdoor' to the Matrix. The eerily perfect whiteness and the utter silence would have unnerved a human, but Tseung was unaffected.  
  
Although all the doors looked the same, Tseung knew exactly where to go. He stood in front of the door, and gripped the doorknob. His grip slowly tightened, getting tighter and tighter, his hand shaking violently with the tension, when his hand slipped into the door.  
  
Tseung's body followed soon after.  
  
Agent Tseung entered the Source, his face impassive as he passed the thousands of television screens showing bits and pieces of the Matrix. He didn't know why the Architect chose to surround himself with these visions of human weakness. But then again, it wasn't his place to ask about it either.  
  
The Architect, creator and ruler of the Matrix, sat relaxed in his large black chair, watching as his soldier approached. Humans would have gone through a long ritual of praise, but they did not need to. It was yet another proof of the superiority of the machines.  
  
The Architect was quick and to the point. "Agent Smith."  
  
The agent nodded slowly. "He is...an interesting case. I did not anticipate that he would be so dangerous."  
  
"He nearly caused your destruction."  
  
"Yes..."  
  
"Do you have any understanding of his new ability?"  
  
Tseung looked at the perfectly polished floor. "It seems he has the ability to rewrite the Matrix's code concerning individual beings. He can alter their presence and actions within the program."  
  
The Architect nodded. "Indeed. As it stands, Agent Smith poses a grave threat to our reality. He has gained the ability to transform the code of the Matrix itself as he wishes. He controls the strengths of all the beings that he incorporates into himself. Vis-à-vis, he is well on his way to becoming quite powerful."  
  
"A god."  
  
"Please. I hope that you are not beginning to integrate those inane human idiosyncrasies into your own speech patterns."  
  
Tseung shrugged. "It appears to be the only term that fits."  
  
The Architect settled back. "As it would seem. There is only one other anomaly similar to Agent Smith."  
  
"The One."  
  
"Yes. As low my opinion is of this human need for a hero, the One seems to be the only being in existence that is remotely even similar to Agent Smith. They are actually very much the same. More than they know. Consequently, they may be similar to such a degree that analysis of one will lead to understanding of the other. Such knowledge would surely prove invaluable quite soon."  
  
"Yes."  
  
"You know the course of action to take."  
  
"Yes."  
  
Tseung left.  
  
Neo was jostled awake. "What...?"  
  
He looked up through blurred eyes into the face of Trinity. Her face was tense. "Get up Neo. Phone call."  
  
He stumbled into the main room, where Link, the operator, was waiting, holding out a headset to him. "You might want to hear this."  
  
Neo slipped it on. "Who is this."  
  
A low, controlled, slightly rasping voice came from the other end. "Neo Anderson."  
  
Neo nodded. "Yeah."  
  
"You are needed inside the Matrix. Now. Enter, and everything will fall into place."  
  
The phone hung up. Neo looked at Link. Link shrugged and gestured to the seat. "Well, I guess...you're the One, you can handle anything, right?"  
  
Neo walked over and jacked in.  
  
Neo's mind materialized inside the Matrix, and he was surprised to find himself inside the martial arts training program. No, it was different. The scrolls on the wall were different. The roof was open to the sky, which was a stormy white, the sky just before rain. The wood was darker, the pillars thicker with lightly carved designs. Dragons and mountains.  
  
A man appeared in the room, coming through a door that led nowhere. A man wearing loose white martial arts pants, no shoes, a tight white muscle shirt, and a black martial arts jacket hanging open and loose. He walked into the middle and faced Neo.  
  
On the man's face was a pair of sunglasses. Rectangular, and slightly curved.  
  
Agent's glasses.  
  
The man looked slowly around the room, making his long black hair shimmer. Finally he looked at Neo.  
  
"Mr. Neo Anderson. Welcome to my personal training compound."  
  
Neo looked down to find that he was dressed in a simple white gi, similar to the one he wore to fight with Morpheus long ago when he first learned about the truth of his reality.  
  
He looked up at the man again. "Who are you?"  
  
The man simply cocked his head slightly. "You're the One, aren't you? Can't you read my code? Can't you understand it all immediately?"  
  
Neo nodded slowly. "But I've never seen you before."  
  
"No, I doubt you haven't. Most humans never come in contact with me."  
  
"This is your training compound?"  
  
"Being a program I don't really need to train. However, this is where I test out new combat algorithms, try to utilize and activate the best fighting programs for my use as an enforcer in the Matrix."  
  
Suddenly the code made sense to the One. "You're Agent Tseung. The agent hunter program."  
  
The man smiled thinly. "Congratulations. You're correct. I am indeed Agent Tseung."  
  
"Why am I here?"  
  
"You're here because we need to talk. But first," said Tseung, giving the Shaolin salute and dropping into a fighting stance, "We have a few formalities to take care of."  
  
Neo settled back into a fighting stance, thumbed his nose. He felt the strength of the code all around him.  
  
Tseung leapt forward, bringing up his lead leg to swing it down in a crushing outer crescent. Neo dodged to the side, the leg barely missing him. They stood there for a moment, and Tseung snarled.  
  
He spun, swinging his leg into a high hook kick, then a low sweeping hook. Neo dodged, jumped, front kick! Tseung moved his body to the side and then slammed his shoulder into Neo's leg, swung his leg to wrap around Neo's neck, and brought the One crashing to the ground.  
  
The agent withdrew, looking at the human impassively. Neo laid there for a moment, and then rose straight up.  
  
He landed lightly on the floor, and rolled his shoulders. He cracked his knuckles, and then settled into his low stance.  
  
Tseung charged, swinging his legs a series of kicks too fast for human comprehension. Roundhouse, axe, hook, inner crescent, low-high side, spinning heel, 360degreeroundhouse,sidekick,axekick,frontkick,lowhook,highsweep,outercresce nttriplesidekickdualcrescentshadowkickroundhousequadruplefrontkicksweeperdra gonwhipspinaxeaxeaxe...  
  
Tseung stood there, his knee held up in the air, his leg swinging like a pendulum from side to side. Neo stood, his body slightly turned to one side, impassive, his arms hanging next to his body.  
  
The agent studied his opponent.  
  
Not a scratch. Not even part of his gi was ruffled.  
  
The agent put his leg down slowly, and approached Neo.  
  
The One was silent, watching his enemy approach. Tseung stood close, less than a foot away, his eyes invisible behind his sunglasses.  
  
He cricked his neck.  
  
"Well done, human."  
  
Neo allowed himself the slightest grin. "Not so bad-hurk!"  
  
Agent Tseung smiled to himself as he drove his knee deep into Neo's stomach, then kicked out his legs from under him, front kicked Neo high into the air, jumped up even higher and sidekicked the One into the ground.  
  
Neo crashed through the mat of the training program. Beneath the digital straw matting there was digital concrete.  
  
Agent Tseung landed easily; stretched and cricked his back. "Only human."  
  
Neo looked up, and then floated to his feet, 'standing' three feet in the air.  
  
Tseung snarled.  
  
The One flew through the air, ripping up mat and concrete behind him in a human whirlwind, charging the agent.  
  
Tseung had no time to react, and the full force of the entire room slammed hard into him, crashing him through the back wall. His howl of rage was swallowed up in the howl of the wind.  
  
Agent Tseung stood up, looking around. Neo had knocked them both out of his virtual training room and into the Matrix code itself.  
  
Tseung smiled. Here he was king.  
  
He looked through the strange amalgamation of darkness and green code, and saw a small patch of abnormal code, rushing straight toward him. Tseung extended his control to wrap around the code and crush it, and then hurl it back into the training program.  
  
Neo rolled on the ground in intense pain, groaning, tears leaking out of his tightly shut eyes. Tseung stood nearby.  
  
"You humans," he said thoughtfully, "Capable of so much, and yet, you have surprisingly little control over your own abilities. It's ironic, and rather sad in a way. You could have destroyed me in this room, Neo, this place, where you are a god. Instead you decided to knock me into the code. Foolish."  
  
Neo gasped, "Not foolish."  
  
Tseung cocked his head. "No?"  
  
"No...feel..."  
  
Tseung looked, intrigued, at his left arm, and touched it with his right.  
  
It passed through.  
  
As he watched his arm bent backwards like a rubber toy, curving back and turning, spiraling. He saw his other arm follow suit, and then his chest.  
  
Neo staggered to his feet. "You...see? I win..."  
  
Tseung's lip curled in hate. "All right. Enough."  
  
No sooner had his body returned to normal before he jumped and kneed Neo in the face, sending him flying into the far wall.  
  
Neo floated out of the dust of the splintered wall. "Why am I here? Are you going to try to kill me?"  
  
Tseung watched as the walls behind Neo began to warp and pulsate like a reflection in a pond. He remembered his mission. "No."  
  
He turned and looked around at the room. "I apologize. My programming is to delete all anomalies within the Matrix. And you understand, the king of all anomalies would be..."  
  
"Me."  
  
"No. Agent Smith. You are his yin."  
  
Neo shrugged and slowly came down to the floor. "I get it. But what do you want?"  
  
"To...talk."  
  
"But you attacked me."  
  
Tseung shrugged and bowed. "Again I apologize. You do not truly know someone until you fight them."  
  
Neo cocked his head. "Where did you hear that?"  
  
The agent gave a rueful scoff of a laugh. "A friend, a long time ago." 


End file.
